


Melanated Earth

by christiant



Category: DC Elseworlds, Superman - All Media Types
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-29
Updated: 2018-01-01
Packaged: 2019-02-23 07:56:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 2,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13185720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/christiant/pseuds/christiant
Summary: superman is a white-passing black man who was raised by mexicans in smallville, kansas. deal with it.





	1. Karail Rao Zor-El | 1

There had to be more green in Smallville, Kansas than the whole of Planet Krypton. From her brief study of Earth and its’ cultures, Rao learned that the Midwest was considered to be a boring, dry place for the primitive, yet increasingly urbanized humans, but she considered it to be an exotic wonderland. The air was clean, without that sterile smell that permeated Krypton. The water was as blue as the sky, and it came right out of the ground, and there were so many animals! More than she’d seen in her entire life.

Kal-El’s human family were very gracious, and very kind to her. José Sr. wasn’t much of a talker, but he knew everything there was to know about his family’s land and the history of it. He was tender, and kind to every living thing. He didn’t even use pesticides on his crops, preferring to use all-natural, non-lethal methods. He also carried an old swagger, and he had the face of a man who was still handsome in his mid-sixties, but had probably been the resident hometown heart-throb forty years ago, if the way that the older ladies around town batted their eyelashes and twirled their hair like he had eyes for any woman who wasn’t his wife was any indication.

And Ms. Maria-Guadalupe? She reminded Rao so much of Zor-El that it was uncanny. The facial features were vastly different, and her mother and Kal-El’s were completely different shades of brown, different kinds (?) of brown, but if Zor-El’d had a twin in spirit, it’d be Maria-Guadalupe. She made meals that could’ve fed armies, dressed in the human version of that funky, business casual way Zor-El loved, and she watched her novellas nightly, with the same fervor that’d prompted Rao’s mother to follow Lyla Ler-Rol from terrible emotion drama to terrible emotion drama, even after her scandalous nude scene. And although they worshipped vastly different gods (and Maria-Guadalupe’d made her remove every piercing that wasn’t in an earlobe or in her nose), she and Rao always made time to lead each other in their respective prayers.

So, even if Kal-El was insufferable and gleefully ignorant, even if Karail Rao Zor-El missed Krypton like she could feel the loss of it burning within her every time she looked up and saw a yellow sun, even if she would never see anyone who had ever known her again-  
Earth wasn’t all she had.


	2. Lex Luthor | 1

It was an open secret in the Suicide Slums of Metropolis that Mercedes, Chastity, and Temperance bore a striking resemblance to Julian “Leo” Luthor’s only heir, Alexander. No one south of the Simon Projects would ever dare to mention it, on fear of the Luthor name alone. Rude white people mention it all the time, wherever they go, too self-absorbed to realize that every “ _you look so much alike, my God, the two of you could be sisters_ ,” cut deep. 

 

(Not as deep as Lex’s laugh, perpetually blithe and disinterested- a cool, “ _I’ve never really noticed_ ,” spilling from their lips as easy as breathing.)


	3. Kon-El Diary | 1

There is nothing more special in this world than having Lex Luthor’s whole focus on you. The way they hold my face in both their hands is as close to open maternal affection as I will likely ever receive, and I soak in it like Superman does the rays of the sun. 

It was surprising that Luthor was even interested in me, when I came out of the pod. The aloof, cutthroat billionaire and their half-alien clone was clearly a genetic match made in heaven. It was even more surprising that Lex wants me to call them my mother. Mom? Mama? What is a mother, anyway? If it is warm and comforting and tender, Lex Luthor is not it. Lex is very funny about gender, but they decided that if Superman must be my father, I must call them something as well and they may as well be my mother.  
(I tried calling them Dad-2 and they took supreme offense. I think the mother thing may be a reflexive action to keep me from referring to them in any sort of masculine way.)

I have been alive, really alive, for eleven months, and because of Lex, I have a trust-fund ready and “one-way ticket” to the Ivy League. Clark wants me to go to Met U, but I think Lex’s pride would be irreparably damaged if I went anywhere other than Princeton. I don’t think, I know. Lex went on Tawny Young’s late night show and told her that they would rather die than live knowing that their son went to a state school. It’s not that I think Lex is an elitist or anything, as nouveau riche as they are, but they worked hard to get out of the gutter, and would prefer if I stayed out as well. 

Lex would also prefer that I not date until I’m 30. I think if I had been conceived “naturally” and grown up “normally” (sn: still can’t believe that other people aren’t made like that), Lex would have an easier time dealing with the fact that I’m a teenager, they and the Virtues respond to me the same way they probably would a child. I suppose. I wouldn’t really know, Lex despises children and goes out of their way to evade their company. I think Lex is uncomfortable talking about anatomical issues with me, and stuff about intercourse, because it makes Lex feel more different than they already do, just by existing. I think dating, the idea of me dating, going through puberty, or engaging in acts of intimacy freaks Lex out because there was never anybody for them to talk to them about it except for an older sister they can't bear to acknowledge as a relative who had different body issues stemming from a different personal identity. Clark’s no help whatsoever. Clark grew up in a staunchly Catholic Mexican household in Smallville, Kansas, and grew up to be a relatively heterosexual (?) cisgender black man. Lex is a bisexual, nonbinary person from the Suicide Slums of Metropolis. They and their father had never referred to them with any pronouns whatsoever, and Lex didn’t even experience sexual attraction until they got to Princeton. 

Worst two choices ever, BTW. 

I don’t even feel like they need to give me any kind of “talk” of advice most of the time, cause I learned a lot in my pod. I was created to replace the Superman or succeed Lex Luthor, so I know about sex and gender. If I hadn’t let on that I didn’t know about things like crosswalks and Miranda rights, Lex never would’ve tried to talk to me about it.  
I’m glad Clark stopped. 

From his aborted attempts, I’m getting the feeling that I should be glad his Kryptonian DNA fights off diseases. It’s not a way you particularly want to think about your father. 

Oh, God. Lex is coming to “talk” to me again. Later. 

UPDATE!!!!!!:  
Apparently some guy named George Michael had a song in the 80s where he said “sex is natural, sex is good. Not everybody does it, but everybody should.” 

I know this because my mother played it twice and then made me watch a video about consent. And then had the audacity to ask: “Any questions?” after. 

Conclusion: I think my parents kind of suck at parenting. The television machine should have prepared me for this. 

UPDATE 2:  
Apparently Clark’s girlfriend Lois is like, super cool! And her dad is this big deal army guy, so she knows a lot about emotionally scarring, uber perfunctory sexual education. We had a nice talk and then she told me I could come to her if I had any questions. I’ve always gotten the feeling that Lex doesn’t like Lois, or that she makes them uncomfortable or something, but I’ve never seen them look more relieved to see her walk through a door in my entire 11 mos. of life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Things I'll Never Do Like Superman:  
> -Anything related to sexual education.  
> -Accidentally almost tell sex stories about alien space babes.
> 
> Things I'll Never Do Like Lex Luthor:  
> -Anything related to sexual education.  
> -Play pop music from like, the 1980s in lieu of NORMAL discussions about sexual education.


	4. Jacqueline Napier, Super-Villain Extraordinaire

Jacque Napier always wanted to be a gangster’s wife, as Scorsese as it sounds.

It’s odd, considering who she would grow up to be; but her momma was Carmine Falcone’s wife’s maid, and eleven year old Jacqueline Frances Napier wanted nothing more in life than to be a gangster’s wife. 

Even at eleven, she was beautiful. She was in love with gold, and jewels, even if she’d only seen them from afar. Even at eleven, she knew the kinds of things she’d have to do to get them. It almost didn’t bother her. She’d rather be some mafioso’s boozed up trophy than a maid like momma, carrying the weight of an entire family on her meager little wages and going home to some heavy handed asshole who put everything that wasn’t going to bills and food straight up his nose and praying to “God” like he actually gave a shit about anybody unlucky enough to be born in Gotham City. 

If Jacque had never met Fish Mooney, I guarantee that you’d have still heard of her. She’d have rode being beautiful as far as it could take her into the upper echelon of Gotham City society. She’d have no discernible skills, no particular talents or interests. Yet, you’d be enraptured by what she wore and where she went because of whatever poor zhlob she’d preyed on and married.

But instead, when Jacque is thirteen and already hollow-eyed and too old for her age, Maria Mercedes “Fish” Mooney becomes a part of Don Falcone’s inner circle. She is dressed like the girl’s outside Jacque’s bedroom window at night. She is angular, and muscular, and alluring, with her sharp tongue and the baseball bat that she totes along like the Don’s security pack their pistols.

Everyday Fish sits her black, sequin-clad ass on a sparkling granite counter top in Ms. Luz’s kitchen with nothing more than a “ _dios mio_ ” from the older Mexican lady, who certainly would’ve struck Jacque across the palms for _attempting_ to do the same. Luz makes her a turkey sandwich with provolone and pepper on berry wheat bread, and she pretends to just notice Jacque before every first bite, looking down her nose from the sandwich with a full mouth to say: “ _Shouldn’t you be in school, kid?_ ” with a smile, like she herself didn’t only have a formal tenth grade education before she’d put herself in GED classes and started climbing the Falcone family ranks. 

Fish took it in stride when she never replied. She’d been young and hungry once, and she understood what it was like to be a pretty little girl in Gotham City, never wanting to draw attention to yourself. But she’d taken that, herself. She’d already learned what Jacque was teaching herself, that the price of beauty was high, she was just determined that the rest of the world would pay the cost. She’d made herself bright and shiny, eccentrically visible. Through that hyper-visibility, she’d made herself indestructible. 

When Jacque Napier falls and The Joker rises from a vat of acid, she remembers Fish Mooney’s sinister, steady gaze. 

She wants to watch the world burn.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the real reason why Lex Luthor hates Superman.

Lex Luthor is in a laboratory when Superman fights that damn trash-talking idiot radio chick turned fourth-rate supervillain. 

(Lex Luthor (like _all_ Superman haters) was secretly a fan, or at least had been.)

That idiot _**Livewire**_ , in her idiotic quest for misguided revenge on Superman in lieu of taking personal responsibility for her own idiotic actions, causes rolling blackouts all over Metropolis. 

Lex Luthor is in a laboratory when Superman and Livewire’s fight causes rolling blackouts all over Metropolis. For once, their research is shady, but it’s on the right side of legal. It’s even on the right goddamn side of government approved, which, in hindsight, is not saying much. 

Predictably, due to the nature of most of their research, there is an explosion in the lab. Unpredictably, due to the _massive_ rolling blackout occurring after Leslie Willis idiotically (an unsuccessfully) tried to run herself through every high-powered electronic device in the city, the planned, controlled explosion multiplies. 

Luckily, the founder and CEO of LexCorp, with their iron constitution, is the only person even close enough to be injured, and they most definitely are not. 

Unluckily, as they are watching G. Gordon Godfrey’s apt coverage of the Superman vs. Livewire fight on Metropolis Nightly News, they scratch the side of their head and their fingers come back covered in their own downy soft curls. When they put their hand back, there is only smooth fuzz there. 

Worse, Superman’s face floods the screen. It’s illogical, but it fills them with hatred.

“That white mother _ **fucker**_ ,” they whisper angrily and irrationally under their breath. Mercy is gone and they are alone, and obviously no one can hear them.


End file.
